1. I just wanted to draw loretta in a bikini I like women ok
2. Wirman reads one of lorettas books (she's a romance/smut author) for the first time this is pre submarine and when he starts to develop a crush aww awww
3. Lorettas about the author page and some dialogue for when you ask about wirman
timeline of the events around mortuga's death in chronological order
Obviously, major mermaid mask spoilers, I directly mention the culprit and how they do it
It all starts with Mariana Moon coming onto the submarine. She hands Magnus Mortuga the black box, after which he tells her to wait in the control room.
He heads to the captain's cabin and at some point Godrik Gripp- who was just lurking around I guess- joins him, the broken radio picking up only on half of their conversation. Mariana hears this from the other radio in Sylvia Seafoam's old jacket's pocket and records it with her pipe dictaphone.
Mortuga and Gripp find the necklace key in the box and have their argument, which makes Mortuga decide to open the cauldron holding the mermaid's tongue.
Mortuga leaves Gripp behind with the necklace key and heads back to the control room where Mariana is, now looking both sad and angry.
During this time Gripp wedges the necklace key into the mechanism to later kill Mortuga if he tries to open the cauldron,
after which he heads to the mess hall where J.D Wirman is trying to work on his book so as to not wake up Dirk Dansom in their room.
Very little time passes before Mariana heads down to the mess hall as well on Mortuga's request. Mortuga soon follows her, telling both Wirman and Gripp to show her around the submarine and introduce her to the others, something which in hindsight might have been meant to keep them all occupied. Wirman makes an excuse and leaves (after which he falls asleep) but Gripp can't seem to make up anything and is stuck showing her around (As was probably Mortuga's intent).
He begins to take her past every room in the shipโ
something to note being the captain's cabin being locked at this point, which would otherwise mean Mortuga wasn't thereโ but we know that it's very possibly exactly because Mortuga WAS there, moving his desk to the side and opening the latch in the floor to prepare for the bell to lower.
Something else of note is that they run into Zacharias Zephyr carrying an empty glass bottleโ he's just dropped Hex off in the airlock.
Gripp takes Mariana through the rest of the submarine. they end up in the bilge and Gripp opens the grate in the ceiling.
Around this time, Mortuga has left the Captain's Cabin and heads down to the storeroom/the illusion theatre, where he witnesses Symmetry Silkmoth performing her new trick (It's vague on whether or not she had already set up or if she first went to go get him? Especially because when Mariana and Gripp walk past there on the tour the door is shut).
Mariana and Gripp hear all of this from below in the bilge through the grate, and Mariana uses her dictaphone to record it, when she runs out of tape, decides she's heard enough and heads back to the cargo hold.
She leaves Gripp behind in the bilge, who I presume stays there a while to listen and see if Mortuga will open the cauldron.
Outside the ship, Hex is swimming past the window of the storeroom and witnesses Mortuga lower the bell.
Mortuga hugs himself against the bell to reach the mechanism that unlocks the cauldron, when the necklace key swiftly slices him through the throat, and he's killed. Gripp hurries over to the control room to tilt the ship and get the eyeball key, after which said tilt then wakes up nearly every single goddamn other person on board.
This causes Sinthia to notice Symmetry was already awake and they talk about the stargazing girl because Symmetry is feeling guilty thinking she ruined Mortuga's mood earlier. Sinthia suggests Sym can always take it down later
before she goes over to the control room to check who's there, but she doesn't find anyone.
In the meantime Gripp rushes over to the bilge to collect the eyeball key,
(which Madam Tadpole hears)
unlocks the cabin, climbs down, gets the mermaid's tongue from the cauldron, removes the necklace key from the bell, climbs back up, pulls the bell up manually and puts Mortuga's floor and desk back the way it was before โ all with lightning fucking speed I must assume because most of that had to be done by the time Tadpole got there sans maybe the floor and desk part.
He then either takes the ladder up to the captain's quarters and gets to the aft deck that way, or he guns it back through the parlor onto the fore deck, and then swims over to the aft deck.
I'm inclined to think it's the latter, because the ladder to the captain's quarters isn't down when we get to it (and there's no apparent way to pull it up when you're up there in game at least) plus we don't know if Gripp even knew about the switch in the painting in the first place.
That, and Symmetry mentions having found the eyeball key in the parlorโ which could suggest him dropping it in his rush to get to the fore deck. Though he does mention not being a good swimmer, so it could still be the former and he lost the key later? I don't know.
Sinthia then goes onto the fore deck but doesn't see anyone (either because Gripp only arrives a bit later or because he was already on the aft deck and she just didn't think to look over there) and heads back to the control room.
Meanwhile, Tadpole has seen the blood in the bilgewater, opened the door to the storeroom, found Magnus dead, and is now on the warpath; so she also goes up to the fore deck where she sees Gripp on the aft deck, wearing the mermaid's tongue (and assumes he's a demon).
While that's happening Symmetry has gotten up out of bed and decided to head to the illusion theater / storeroom to take down her act, thus happening upon Mortuga's corpse, and she lets out a scream.
Gripp begins to speak through the mask, calling on the mermaid, which causes a bunch of things to happen at once: the ship's compass and Dirk's watch both go haywire,
a green glow begins to form which wakes up dr Zephyr who was taking a brief nap I guess, and both Sinthia and Symmetry see the Mermaid herselfโ
Synthia through the underwater imaging system,
And Symmetry through the storeroom window.
Tadpole also sees the green glow and weird ass noises shit going on and decidedly Doesn't Fuck with That, so she chucks one of the rowboat oars at Gripp, knocking the Mermaid's tongue off his head and into the ocean, interrupting the summoning.
It's so dark that I guess without the ominous green glow illuminating him she can't see Gripp slink off to... wherever he slinks off to (he probably hides out in the Captain's quarters until she's gone or he just exits that way if he still has the eyeball key at this point) so instead she dives off the side of the submarine to find whatever she just knocked off it.
Symmetry's scream attracts the attention of both Dirk and Wirman, who make their way to their storeroom just in time for Dirk to see someone (tadpole) swim down past the window.
Tadpole finds the mermaid's tongue floating in the water, and takes it back up to her room through the airlock.
While she's doing that, Sinthia (taking the haywire compass to the engine room to get it fixed) and Zephyr (going to re-collect Hex from the airlock) briefly bump into eachother in the parlor.
After they continue on their way, Madam Tadpole stops both of them seperately and tells them both to come to the storeroom (and tells Sinthia to gather the others as well).
Zephyr then collects Hex from the airlock but comes across the Mermaid's Tongue in the process, and quickly decides to take it and hide it in his room where it will be more secure.
In the engine room, Sinthia talks to Gripp (who must've had to haul absolute ass to get there before her) and asks him to fix the compass. He agrees, and they go to get and head to the storeroom with Mariana Moon, who stays behind them just long enough
To run into Zacharias Zephyr on his way to bring Hex and the Mermaid's tongue to the dream chamber.
After he concludes his task, Zephyr heads to the storeroom with the rest, and finally, every soul on the ship is gathered at the crime scene.
Tadpole demands to know who is responsible for Mortuga's Murder, but everyone stays silent. The vibes are rancid, and eventually someone mentions that Symmetry was the last person seen with Mortuga, which upsets Sinthia and her and Sym leave.
They go to look for any kind of will Mortuga might have left behind, first trying the captain's cabin, but it's locked.
Next, the girls try the control room, where Sinthia finds the Contract and the Captain's logbook. She takes them with her to her and Symmetry's room, where she presumably forges Mortuga's signature.
However, she drops one of the papers outside of Dirk and Wirman's room, where Symmetry (lagging behind somewhat) pick it up and assumed it belongs to Wirman,
So she 'returns' it to his typewriter.
Speaking of Wirman, He's the next person to leave the crime scene (Tadpole is scaring him shitless) and a while after him so do Dirk and Mariana, at around the same time.
Only Tadpole, Zephyr, and Gripp remain, and stay behind with Mortuga's body.
CHAPTER ONE OF ACCIDENTAL MISUNDERSTANDINGS IS NOW FULLY UPDATED AND OUT :D
It's a slowburn fic for Dirk x Wirman and the first chapter is entirely Wirman focused. It was cowritten with @grippsbiggestfan, who literally saved it
Click here to read it on AO3 (i pray the link works)
Little voice acting touch I love about Mariana Moon
The way Jacqui Bardelang (Moon's VA) speaks anytime Moon has her pipe between her teeth: they DEFINITELY did the same whenever she was making this pose. Perhaps a pencil, or something else.
It's a small detail they didn't need to do, but they did. I love when they add small touches like this one!
spoilers for the end of mermaid mask, just some thoughts im having after just finishing a replay of tangle tower lol
one theme that i noticed is present in both Tangle Tower and The Mermaid Mask that i find incredibly compelling, is the way much of the casts for each game are to some degree Trapped within the setting of the game. whether its the family members feeling chained to the island of the tower, unable to leave due to their roots and responsibilities, vs the crew of the submarine feeling unable to return to land, either from some sense of responsibility, or just a lack of anywhere else they feel they belong. it does a wonderful job of making me really feel bad for and root for these characters, especially for the victims and the murderers. because neither of them get to truly leave, in the end.
it also makes it feel even more satisfying, that Fifi & Poppy, and now Sinthia and Symmetry, were able to leave. i have a feeling the four of them will be able to understand eachother very deeply, and i think that Sally felt that way too, hence why she set it up in the first place. she can see the same feeling of being trapped in Sinthia and Symmetry, that she first saw in Fifi and Poppy. and if i remember correctly (its been a while, i plan to rewatch a playthrough of the previous game) Sally is probably somewhat acquainted with that feeling, herself.
it also adds onto the tragedy of Freya and Magnus's deaths so much. they both longed for freedom more than almost anything, but the possibility was taken from them. both when they were so close to it.
whereas for Penelope and Gripp, that 'freedom' from their locations only furthered their misery. they felt trapped by the tower and the submarine, but the outside world held only a similar feeling of emptiness for them. one can only hope that in the end they are able to find the true freedom and fulfillment theyve craved for so long. especially after the things theyve done to try and get it
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